Reactionary policy tends to be bad policy.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo is introducing "emergency protections" for nail-salon workers, following a New York Times exposé last week on their low pay and possibly hazardous conditions. Is this an example of swift action to remedy an overlooked issue? Or reactionary politicians recognizing a good opportunity to grab power and PR points when they see it? To answer that question, let's consider who will actually benefit from the governor's nail salon decree.

duluoz cats/Flickr

Under the new rules, nail salons will be required to post notices in six languages about workers' rights—a move that probably falls in the won't help, won't hurt category. Another step will require salons to be bonded, "to ensure … that workers can eventually be paid if salon owners are found to have underpaid the workers" and also hide their assets from legal authorities. But what are the chances an owner who both eschews wage laws and engages in fraud are going to bother getting bonded? While this move is unlikely to add meaningful protection for workers, it will, however, drive up the cost of doing business for every nail salon in the state.

The biggest part of Cuomo's plan will send state and city inspectors into nail salons regularly, which may sound good in theory. He even promises inspectors won't inquire about workers' immigration status. Many of the women interviewed by the Times were in the country illegally, as well as working without the required state license for manicurists. Cuomo didn't say whether inspectors would be concerned with the professional licensing aspect. Regardless, putting law enforcement agents in increased contact with marginalized groups seldom works to their benefit. Week after week, I read stories about cities upping inspections of things like massage parlors and strips clubs. The stated reason is always noble: to ferret out human trafficking. But without fail these investigators wind up citing people for things like prostitution, building code violations, stripping without proper paperwork, and employing undocumented immigrants. The best laid plans of progressives and policymakers often play out very differently in the hands of government agents with quotas to meet, fees to collect, and a sense of personal purpose to fulfill.

Lastly, Cuomo will require all nail-salon workers to wear gloves and face masks, and salon owners to ensure proper ventilation. From the original Times articles, it seems like these simple steps could go a long way to improving worker safety and health—and be much more meaningful than the suggestion that the Food and Drug Administration simply ban nail-polish ingredients that aren't harmful with the right precautions. Again, I fear that the requirements will be used (like so many occupational safety rules are) to selectively harass and intimidate certain salons out of business, rather than as a small stick to encourage safe practices. But, in theory at least, this is the requirement that make the most sense to me.

Cuomo's office said they started drafting the new nail salon rules Thursday, the day the first New York Times nail-salon article was published. With all due respect to the impressive reporting therein, we ding college kids for writing research papers based on a single source. Do we really think it's prudent for politicians to write laws predicated on the same? Reactionary policy tends to be bad policy.

So does policy based on othering and exoticizing groups of people. On a HuffPost Live segment I participated in this morning, several of the other panelists critiqued the system wherein nail salon employees work solely for tips during weeks to months of training before receiving a regular wage, and sometimes must pay the salon owner for the training. Can you think of any other industry operating under such an exploitative system?, the host asked. They could not.

But what about internships—many of which involve unpaid work without so much as a promise of employment thereafter? What about the wannabe stylists at fancy, organic Aveda salons, who also work for nothing but tips during their training period? What about people who pay school tuition plus an up-front cut to the state for licensing before being permitted to work? How is that scenario any different than paying a small business owner in the community to train you directly? In general, we recognize that people may choose to do all of these things, however suboptimal, based on a rational assessment of future benefits. Here's a snippet from my post last Friday on the issue:

Would workers be better off with no jobs or means to support themselves? Living back in their home countries? Maybe in some cases, yes, but we don't know because we are not them. And I tend to believe that immigrant salon workers, being as intelligent and rational as the rest of us, are capable of weighing their own interests and situations and acting accordingly.

It was the most criticized part of my post by liberals on social media. Is it bad to be a slave? We don't know, we're not them!, folks mocked.

But we're not talking about slavery or involuntary servitude. We're talking about people who choose, every day, to go into these jobs. They might not have a lot of other options (thanks in part to U.S. immigration policy), but it's insulting to those who've had to endure the horrors of slavery to say women getting paid in tips are slaves.

There is certainly value in recognizing the acknowledging the effects of power differentials and privilege. These's also risk in reading too much into them. When you see the same practices as unconscionably exploitative in foreign or unfamiliar communities that you see as standard in your own, you might be perverting privilege theory to play savior. At the very least, you might not be thinking these issues through. It feels good to say, "This is bad. Let's send the government in to stop it." It does good to actually consider the unique needs of underprivileged communities, the reality of their interactions with law enforcement, and the unintended consequences of sending the ultimate power differential (state power) their way. I'm seeing way too many people content to stop at step one.

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It was the most criticized part of my post by liberals on social media. Is it bad to be a slave? We don’t know, we’re not them!, folks mocked.

No disrespect, Ms. Nolan-Brown, but what do you expect from the proglodytes? You defended the notion of poor people having worse jobs than rich people. It really doesn’t matter if the decision was rational or optimal given the situation or how much evidence you present that the situation isn’t as bad as they suggest. You sided with the out group against the in group.

If you want to be tight with the social justice cadres, you better not go with those independent thoughts. The collective has made its decision. Really, you are going to have to decide one of these days whether or not you’re going to toe the lion or not.

It was the most criticized part of my post by liberals on social media. Is it bad to be a slave? We don’t know, we’re not them!, folks mocked.

No disrespect, Ms. Nolan-Brown, but what do you expect from the proglodytes? You defended the notion of poor people having worse jobs than rich people. It really doesn’t matter if the decision was rational or optimal given the situation or how much evidence you present that the situation isn’t as bad as they suggest. You sided with the out group against the in group.

If you want to be tight with the social justice cadres, you better not go with those independent thoughts. The collective has made its decision. Really, you are going to have to decide one of these days whether or not you’re going to toe the lion or not.

My wife use to go to a nail salon with an Asian man who worked really hard. The guy was saving up to buy his own nail shop so he wouldn’t have to give the house a cut. Oh wait, we can’t have that can we? Anyone who lifts themselves out of poverty is a traitor to the collective.

I was gonna say, every salon here seems to be one or two entrepreneurial SE Asians and all of their less driven kith and kin. God forbid they simply live a life their parents couldn’t dream of while raising kids who feel like the nail salon is beneath them. It isn’t the Progressive Dream, so it must be crushed. The idea that someone running a chain of nail salons makes more than CUNY tenured professors probably makes them insane with jealousy.

Also, by killing the industry, or at least driving the costs up to where only rich women like the governor’s wife will be able to afford to go to nail salons, it gets rid of all those icky bourgeois types getting manicures.

I’ve seen people complain a lot about how these cheap, tacky nail salons proliferate in certain areas. Especially the kinds of immigrant/low-income communities that largely border gentrifying areas. I suspect the new regs will mostly be used selectively to shut down salons in areas where more desirable “development” could go

Of course, never for a minute think that they might have anything in common with those ignorant GOP immigration restrictionists. Because those conservatives want to force out immigrants because of prejudice and bigotry. The progressives want to force out immigrants because they care about them. So, the two things are, like, totally different.

This was my immediate first thought, but then I got to thinking since this regulation is essentially going to kill 90% of the industry what’s the point?

Because 10% of the current nail salons will be much easier to regulate and tax than the current 100%. And the owners of the remaining 10% will be more likely to make the kind of campaign contributions that make elected officials nice to them.

But what about internships?many of which involve unpaid work without so much as a promise of employment thereafter? What about the wannabe stylists at fancy, organic Aveda salons, who also work for nothing but tips during their training period? What about people who pay school tuition plus an up-front cut to the state for licensing before being permitted to work? How is that scenario any different than paying a small business owner in the community to train you directly?

I support banning internships for for-profit companies for this reason, however, there is a big difference in that the workers in these nail salons are in poverty and have no way to get out of poverty.

My ancestors have been oppressing Negroes for generations, I wish we had thought of these arguments. Look, the sharecropers *want* to sharecrop. Why else would they be doing it? We aren’t *forcing* them to. Sure, they might not have any other options, but that’s someone else’s fault.

The thing that gets me about American is that he’s so stupid that he can’t figure out how to get to Stormfront. It’s possible that he is so stupid he doesn’t realize that he’s *not* posting at Stormfront.

True story. My wife has blonde hair and brown eyes, and I was wondering how common that was, so I Googled it. Clicked on the first link which seemed to ask the exact same question: Is blonde hair and brown eyes rare?

I was just reminded from another article that they’ve been wanting to institute a grading system for nail salons (like they do for restaurants) since this time last year but it hasn’t had much support. So…..

Oh totally – I think the most likely explanation for this whole thing is to provide a boost to the civic inspection batallion. And when most of the salons are regulated out of business, they’ll just find something else to regulate. Or they’ll just sit at their desk and collect a paycheck.

There is so much shit that goes on underground in New York. People don’t understand how huge it is and how many people there are. Even a totally obnoxious government like the city government just does not have the resources to control all that. If you want to live under the radar there it is very easy.

My first reaction, as always, was bureaucrats seeking to expand their empire, and not much beyond rolling my eyes. People learning for just tops? None of my business, entirely theirs, end of story as far as I am concerned.

I like the analogy with paying to learn at college. Unfortunately, due to my innate disinterest in either minding other people’s business or trying to change their opinions, I find it really hard to make the leap you did, so I’m always appreciative of people who have that ability.

And yet the best the Times can muster on Hillary’s shady dealings is “some people say” type articles. If it were [insert non-democratic candidate here] they’d have 12 reports assigned to the beat doing an archaeological investigation, dusting off every fucking shard of pottery with a camel hair paintbrush.

If one of the problems that Cuomo is trying to solve is worker exposure to chemical fumes, then these workers are going to have to wear some pretty serious PPE. The “germ control” face mask won’t cut. We’re talking more along the lines of a NIOSH mask. Depending on what and how much needs to be filtered, those can be pretty heavy-duty.

There are lots of Korean owned nail salons and beauty parlors in NY. Their nail salon association has accused the NY article for its bias and has promised a response to the crackdown. It’s clear as what these inspections will do to a lot of these businesses.

I guess this is one of those moments liberals get to play republicans and insist that the “law is that law”. Even though these shadow economy was created when they neglected to enforce immigration laws.

Employers hire illegals precisely to skirt regulation and save on cost. Even Helen Keller would know that the shadow economy runs on cash transactions. Liberal simply don’t understand this. Illegal aliens are not some good Samaritans who come here only to fill voids left by natives.

I guess if the libs start cracking down harder on immigrants for wage theft, some of them might wonder what the GOP (the media insisting every second that they need immigrant support) can do for them. The irony.